Do we need to game plan our O to protect our D?

[chad72]

We have seen those days. Score quickly on the opposing D and let our pass rushers in Freeney and Mathis loose protecting a lead. The days nowadays are different. We don't have the same quality arsenal of pass rushers and outside our DL, there are holes everywhere on D magnified probably by our injuries in the secondary.

 

So, should our offensive game plans need to be designed with the intent to keep our D off the field a tad more than usual (at least till we get healthier on all fronts on D)? Short passing instead of taking too many long shots, RB and TE dumpoffs, and creative ways to run the ball, all with the main goal of controlling TOP and protecting our D.

 

Or is the premise of running an offensive game plan to protect the D a flawed one? Thoughts???

[jbaron04]

I don't think we that good where we can pic and choose when and we're we score 

[Jason_]

If more players get hurt then it may come to that.  When close to fully healthy though, I think the defense will surprise a lot of people.  I don't think we'll have to gameplan the offense to protect the defense.  The offense just needs to be at least semi competent in terms of sustaining drives

[krunk]

It's flawed.  For one you don't even know what the defense will look like and you're asking us to assume it will be a bad weak link.  If you used this logic last year you got hit quickly with the reality that the offense was the weak link.  For two the goal of the offense is to score points regardless of the defense. The mindset you are presenting says "Let's not perform to our maximum ability" so that we can "protect" our D from under performing.  That in itself will cause the offense to perform poorly which puts pressure on the defense anyway.  And again we haven't played any regular season games to know what the D will look like. It's all based on invalid assumptions.

[Shepman]

Score as often as you can by any means neccessary. 

[NorthernBlue]

An improved running game would go a long way into keeping the defence rested. 

 

But I wouldn't want to restrict the O from making big plays just to keep the defence 'rested'. I'd rather score 7 points in a minute long drive than 3 in a 5 minute drive 

[Coffeedrinker]

CHad, I think a few years ago the idea had some merit.  Nowadays though since the rules are set up to favor the offense so much I think the quick score mentality is the way to go.  Not to say you should not have the safety valves available, just that they should not be the 1st or 2nd option on most plays.

 

When you take your shots down field there is a better than average chance the defense will get called for some penalty, whether it be defensive holding, PI, roughing the QB because you hit him somewhere other than between the belt and shoulder pads.

 

Just MO of course.

[AZColt11]

I would agree score any which way you can.  And often.  That will take pressure off the D.

[aaron11]

against an offense like the steelers yeah we probably should consider it

 

our running game may not be good enough to do it though

[Superman]

If it were up to me, I would always try to use my offense to protect my defense. Extend drives, score points, gain field position, protect the ball. Yeah you'll need the defense to make some plays and get some stops, but if the offense is efficient and on schedule, it helps special teams and defense tremendously.

 

Add in the thinking that the defense isn't going to be very good -- and we can debate this all day long, but I don't think many of us are optimistic -- and it's even more critical that the offense pick up the slack. 

[ColtsFanMikeC]

2 minutes ago, Superman said:

If it were up to me, I would always try to use my offense to protect my defense. Extend drives, score points, gain field position, protect the ball. Yeah you'll need the defense to make some plays and get some stops, but if the offense is efficient and on schedule, it helps special teams and defense tremendously.

 

Add in the thinking that the defense isn't going to be very good -- and we can debate this all day long, but I don't think many of us are optimistic -- and it's even more critical that the offense pick up the slack. 

 

We have the speed and, IMO, ability on our offense to score quick or convert very big plays.  This ability, IMO, will be made stronger if we develop a running attack and a short passing game (i.e., picking up short chunks of yardage consistently should set the other defense up to be beaten by the big play).

 

I agree with you, the offense is critical to helping the defense (and STs).  However, I'm not sure if by 'extend drives' you mean by time, or if you mean just avoiding 3 and outs.  I think it will be beneficial if our offense can both score and kill clock, but if I had to choose between the 2, I'd say scoring is more important, especially early in the game.

 

A problem we've had in the Pagano/Luck era is starting very slow and being forced to win via comeback.  If we can score early in the game, I do believe it will help make the other offense more one-dimensional (which may not always be a good thing, as right now I think where I'm concerned with the D is more the pass rush and secondary than the run stopping).  Regardless, I think it is going to be important for our O to score early and as often as possible.

 

What I think is most important, as you mentioned, is for our offense to protect the ball and even if we're not scoring to put the ST and D in good field position.  The biggest fear I have about our offense (Andrew in particular) is that if our D is not playing well that he will try to force things (he has been guilty of this in the past, and I swear, many of Peyton's interceptions on the Colts were due to him forcing balls to try to keep our defense off the field). 

[Superman]

14 minutes ago, ColtsFanMikeC said:

 

We have the speed and, IMO, ability on our offense to score quick or convert very big plays.  This ability, IMO, will be made stronger if we develop a running attack and a short passing game (i.e., picking up short chunks of yardage consistently should set the other defense up to be beaten by the big play).

 

I agree with you, the offense is critical to helping the defense (and STs).  However, I'm not sure if by 'extend drives' you mean by time, or if you mean just avoiding 3 and outs.  I think it will be beneficial if our offense can both score and kill clock, but if I had to choose between the 2, I'd say scoring is more important, especially early in the game.

 

A problem we've had in the Pagano/Luck era is starting very slow and being forced to win via comeback.  If we can score early in the game, I do believe it will help make the other offense more one-dimensional (which may not always be a good thing, as right now I think where I'm concerned with the D is more the pass rush and secondary than the run stopping).  Regardless, I think it is going to be important for our O to score early and as often as possible.

 

What I think is most important, as you mentioned, is for our offense to protect the ball and even if we're not scoring to put the ST and D in good field position.  The biggest fear I have about our offense (Andrew in particular) is that if our D is not playing well that he will try to force things (he has been guilty of this in the past, and I swear, many of Peyton's interceptions on the Colts were due to him forcing balls to try to keep our defense off the field). 

 

By extend drives, I mean convert third downs. If I have to choose between a quick TD drive and a long FG drive, I'll take the quick 7 points almost every time (save for a four minute situation where the FG basically ices it). 

 

And I agree, getting off to a fast start is critical. Pagano seems to mention that every time he talks, because when this team has had slumps over the past three years, it's been because they start slowly and are down 2+ score in the second quarter. 

[Coffeedrinker]

31 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

By extend drives, I mean convert third downs. If I have to choose between a quick TD drive and a long FG drive, I'll take the quick 7 points almost every time (save for a four minute situation where the FG basically ices it). 

 

And I agree, getting off to a fast start is critical. Pagano seems to mention that every time he talks, because when this team has had slumps over the past three years, it's been because they start slowly and are down 2+ score in the second quarter. 

I agree converting on 3rd downs is key.

[Buck Showalter]

"Do we need to game plan our O to protect our D????"

 

i think this is code talk for "Colts need a RUN game!"

 

[Gavin]

Pretty simple. If we have trouble running the ball like we have since 2008 which I fully expect to be the case regardless of the fact that Ryan Kelly is our new Center then just be ready for more of the same pass heavy attack. Its not that I don't have faith in Philbin to be able to teach but more of a reflection of talent along the O Line and an old rb who I believe is running on fumes.

[ColtsFanMikeC]

1 hour ago, Superman said:

 

By extend drives, I mean convert third downs. If I have to choose between a quick TD drive and a long FG drive, I'll take the quick 7 points almost every time (save for a four minute situation where the FG basically ices it). 

 

And I agree, getting off to a fast start is critical. Pagano seems to mention that every time he talks, because when this team has had slumps over the past three years, it's been because they start slowly and are down 2+ score in the second quarter. 

 

I'm hoping Chud will be the one to fix the slow start problem.  He seems (from what we saw last year and what we saw vs. Baltimore) to excel at putting players into positions where they excel.  He also seems to be a bit better at game planning specifically against the opposing defense than Pep, as well as better at adjusting than Pep (Pep's stubbornness used to bug the crap out of me) -- I assume he'll still have the first drive set pretty firmly going into games, but that he'll be a bit better at adjusting come drive 2, 3, and 4 if it's warranted.

 

 

[Superman]

12 minutes ago, ColtsFanMikeC said:

 

I'm hoping Chud will be the one to fix the slow start problem.  He seems (from what we saw last year and what we saw vs. Baltimore) to excel at putting players into positions where they excel.  He also seems to be a bit better at game planning specifically against the opposing defense than Pep, as well as better at adjusting than Pep (Pep's stubbornness used to bug the crap out of me) -- I assume he'll still have the first drive set pretty firmly going into games, but that he'll be a bit better at adjusting come drive 2, 3, and 4 if it's warranted.

 

I was thinking about the 2013 Denver game the other day. Pep had one of the best play calls on the DHB touchdown, down in the red zone. There were quite a few really good play calls from Pep over the two and a half years he was here. 

 

But I don't think he had a good feel for the game, for how to manage an offense, how to break a slump, bust trends, etc. And with a defensive minded head coach, he wasn't getting a lot of help from his direct boss. And like you, I thought he was stubborn at times, despite his insistence that his No Coast Offense would/could do whatever, whenever. In theory, it sounded good; in practice, it didn't work out like we needed it to. There were some glaring issues that actually seemed to get worse as time went on.

 

Chud has some stubbornness about him, also, especially with the inside run game. But he only worked one game with Luck, so it's hard to know how he plans to manage the offense, especially if/when they hit a wall. I hope -- for everyone's sake -- that he has a better handle on game management and makes better adjustments than Pep.

[ColtsFanMikeC]

9 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

I was thinking about the 2013 Denver game the other day. Pep had one of the best play calls on the DHB touchdown, down in the red zone. There were quite a few really good play calls from Pep over the two and a half years he was here. 

 

But I don't think he had a good feel for the game, for how to manage an offense, how to break a slump, bust trends, etc. And with a defensive minded head coach, he wasn't getting a lot of help from his direct boss. And like you, I thought he was stubborn at times, despite his insistence that his No Coast Offense would/could do whatever, whenever. In theory, it sounded good; in practice, it didn't work out like we needed it to. There were some glaring issues that actually seemed to get worse as time went on.

 

Chud has some stubbornness about him, also, especially with the inside run game. But he only worked one game with Luck, so it's hard to know how he plans to manage the offense, especially if/when they hit a wall. I hope -- for everyone's sake -- that he has a better handle on game management and makes better adjustments than Pep.

 

Pep certainly had some very good play calls during his time.  However, a lot of times I found him to be very predictable (as in, I without thoroughly analyzing game film and looking for trends, etc. could often predict what he was going to run).  While there were many times he called good plays here and there, there were also many times where he had a poor overall game plan and refused to shy away from it or adapt mid-game.

 

I'm sure just about every OC/coach in the NFL has some stubbornness to them, but Pep just seemed to be overboard a lot of times (and who knows, there were all sorts of rumors about the coaches not getting to choose the players on the field, etc., so maybe he was limited to an extent).  He also never really seemed to adapt specifically to strengths of our players, which Chud seems to do very well.

 

To Chud's credit, he had a poor OL last year (at least on paper, this year's line should be improved, plus will be using a different scheme and with a better OL Coach) and like you said, only had Andrew 1 game (which I thought was called incredibly well against the league's best defense and super bowl champ).  The WRs on this team are well suited to Luck (his arm strength plus their speed should really allow us to stretch the field), but not so much to Hasselbeck who definitely seemed to lack the arm strength of Luck.

 

As you and I have both discussed in the past, I really (really, really, really) hope Chud figures out how to allow our offense to thrive in the screen game.  We have too much speed to stink it up there yet again, IMO.

[BOTT]

Yes.  Worked well for Dallas a few yrs ago.  But I can't seeing that working for the Colts.

[Gabriel Alexander Morillo]

If you're a football team that needs to plan half of your team a certain way to help out the other half then you have already failed. 

[Superman]

25 minutes ago, Gabriel Alexander Morillo said:

If you're a football team that needs to plan half of your team a certain way to help out the other half then you have already failed. 

 

Because good football teams don't actively look to maximize their strengths and minimize their weaknesses...

[Superman]

29 minutes ago, ColtsFanMikeC said:

As you and I have both discussed in the past, I really (really, really, really) hope Chud figures out how to allow our offense to thrive in the screen game.  We have too much speed to stink it up there yet again, IMO.

 

They've shown a couple times in the preseason already that they can at least get a screen pass done, which is an improvement. I'm not sure we have a receiver who is great after the catch, but we'll find out, I'm sure.

[ColtsFanMikeC]

6 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

They've shown a couple times in the preseason already that they can at least get a screen pass done, which is an improvement. I'm not sure we have a receiver who is great after the catch, but we'll find out, I'm sure.

I really hope Dorsett can be that guy -- the coaches were very high on his ability to return punts last year (before he muffed and got injured), which, to me, suggests he should be good running after the catch.

[aReggie7]

This is going to sound obvious but the Colts need to be one of the top scoring teams in the league. Not only that but they need to be first to score most weeks.

 

Touchdowns are needed. Field goals will not cut it.

 

The offense has the talent to put some serious points on the board each week and they need to maximize that. More points = increased chance of the other team taking more risks on offense = easier for our defense to get stops and turnovers.

[Gavin]

42 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

They've shown a couple times in the preseason already that they can at least get a screen pass done, which is an improvement. I'm not sure we have a receiver who is great after the catch, but we'll find out, I'm sure.

I'm just waiting to see if Chud can find ways to run multiple plays out of a minimal amount of different looks or minimal amount of plays out of many different looks to off set defenses when our offense is actually game planned against instead of seeing what young players have learned. I'm just not putting anything into preseason as far as starters go. I also don't really think Chuds playcalling/design last year will reflect much on what he does this year. Just that he is smart enough to know you have to adjust to the talent you have. I mean there is no way he installed anything of his playbook last year. They had to be in Peps arsenal of plays but never wisely used

[LJpalmbeacher2]

48 minutes ago, Gavin said:

I'm just waiting to see if Chud can find ways to run multiple plays out of a minimal amount of different looks or minimal amount of plays out of many different looks to off set defenses when our offense is actually game planned against instead of seeing what young players have learned. I'm just not putting anything into preseason as far as starters go. I also don't really think Chuds playcalling/design last year will reflect much on what he does this year. Just that he is smart enough to know you have to adjust to the talent you have. I mean there is no way he installed anything of his playbook last year. They had to be in Peps arsenal of plays but never wisely used

 

Last year I'm not sure Chud even knew the verbiage when he took over.

I also expect a different playbook.

[NewColtsFan]

 

To Chad's opening question:    Do we need our O to game plan protect our D?

 

In a word,  the answer is......     Yes.        In two words:     Heck, yes!!

 

And, honestly,  I think that's what you'll see.     I think all this talk about Chud throwing the ball deep a lot is not going to pan out.     Will we throw deep?     Yes,  but I think we'll do as little as possible to keep the defenses honest.     Or, put another way,   we'll do it just enough to keep defenses from crowding the line of scrimmage.

 

I think it's a smart move and a necessary move.     I'll be shocked if we don't do it.

 

 

[Malakai432]

10 hours ago, krunk said:

It's flawed.  For one you don't even know what the defense will look like and you're asking us to assume it will be a bad weak link.  If you used this logic last year you got hit quickly with the reality that the offense was the weak link.  For two the goal of the offense is to score points regardless of the defense. The mindset you are presenting says "Let's not perform to our maximum ability" so that we can "protect" our D from under performing.  That in itself will cause the offense to perform poorly which puts pressure on the defense anyway.  And again we haven't played any regular season games to know what the D will look like. It's all based on invalid assumptions.

 

Yeah I agree,  I was listening to Dakich today and Kravitz automatically was assuming that the D going to suck pretty much.  I have to think it may be good to just wait and see how they fair after the first few games.  There are a lot of new faces on the team and I think the D "fully healthy," had the capability to be very good.  It seems the Colts can't ever avoid the serious injury bug.  

[southwest1]

8 hours ago, Buck Showalter said:

 

i think this is code talk for "Colts need a RUN game!"

 

This is the best & most simple answer. I can't say it any better then Buck did. 

[southwest1]

6 hours ago, Gavin said:

more of a reflection of talent along the O Line and an old rb who I believe is running on fumes.

I know that Frank Gore is not the same back he was when he went to the SB during the 2012 season in New Orleans as a member of the 49ers against Baltimore Gavin, but I still think he has a couple of years worth of tread on those tires. You make it sound like putting down a family pet with arthritis man.

 

Frank was okay last year with no daylight creases to run through in my estimation. 

[Gavin]

39 minutes ago, southwest1 said:

I know that Frank Gore is not the same back he was when he went to the SB during the 2012 season in New Orleans as a member of the 49ers against Baltimore Gavin, but I still think he has a couple of years worth of tread on those tires. You make it sound like putting down a family pet with arthritis man.

 

Frank was okay last year with no daylight creases to run through in my estimation. 

We will see. How's things been for ya man? Ready for some real football!

[Gabriel Alexander Morillo]

8 hours ago, southwest1 said:

I know that Frank Gore is not the same back he was when he went to the SB during the 2012 season in New Orleans as a member of the 49ers against Baltimore Gavin, but I still think he has a couple of years worth of tread on those tires. You make it sound like putting down a family pet with arthritis man.

 

Frank was okay last year with no daylight creases to run through in my estimation. 

I agree with Gavin. I personally don't think he's okay, watching him play reminds me of another old player we have who is a shell of himself. Trent Cole. He also had issues catching the ball/holding onto it iirc. I'm not blaming him or anything though. I think Frank was an outstanding player and is agreat human being but father time has caught up. Or at least that's what I see when I watch him

[SilentHill]

I mean I think it's important to lead in TOP, id hope the Colts can be top 5 in the league this season with TOP. That will surely help the D.

[southwest1]

17 hours ago, Gavin said:

We will see. How's things been for ya man? Ready for some real football!

No worries Gavin. I respect your football intelligence & I didn't mean to create the false impression that I was slamming ya because that was not my intention bro. My apologies if that is what I accidentally did. 

 

I get what you were saying: That Frank didn't look decisive in his cuts or decision making last season. Has he lost a step? Perhaps. I think he still has enough in the tank to get gritty yardage & do fine work on blitz pickup on passing downs. JMO. 

 

Thanks for asking how I'm doing & how my mom is recovering. I appreciate it. I've been driving her to rehab therapy twice a week & we're just taking it day by day for now. She's got a good attitude about it all & doing what she must to feel like herself again. Thanks for your concern Gavin. It means a lot.